Auszüge aus einer Mail an meinen Fahrrad-Konstrukteur und -Guru
Hallo Thomas,
habe zunächst erstmal eine gute Nachricht nachzuholen. Ich bin im vergangen August nach Toronto, Kanada, umgezogen und habe mein größtes Gepäckstück war mein kleines gelbes Fahrrad. Leider konnte ich aus Platzgründen die Körbe nicht mitbringen, aber das hole ich irgendwann oder bastle mir neue. (Zumindest Ortlieb-Quicklock-Schienen kann man hier für Geld kaufen.)
Das Fahrrad mitzubringen war ein riesige Hilfe am Anfang in der neuen Welt. Ohne mich mit U-Bahn und Bus-Tarifen und -Fahrplänen beschäftigen zu müssen, konnte ich gleich am ersten mit meinem Fahrrad zum Kaufhaus fahren und mir Bettzeug kaufen, so dass ich nach der langen Reise endlich schlafen konnte.
Toronto ist wie so ziemlich jede Großstadt bestens zum Radfahren geeignet: die Autos stehen alle im Stau und man kann zwischen ihnen hindurch fahren.
Übrigens habe ich schon vor langer Zeit Dein Blog (unterster Eintrag) gelesen über das Auto, welches ein Flugzeug ziehen kann. Ich denke, dass wir als Radfahrer uns von solchen Aktionen inspirieren lassen sollten, insbesondere Du als Rhein-Anlieger. Warum lädst Du nicht mal ein paar Freunde ein (und evtl. interessierte Kunden, die eines Deiner Velos fahren), nimmst ein paar stramme Taue und ziehst ein Schiff den Rhein hoch. Hundert Meter sollten reichen, um bei Wetten dass...? mitzumachen. Ich denke, wenn das Tau ein bisschen dehnbar ist, haben selbst Shimano-Naben im kleinsten Gang kein Problem mit so einer Last. (Man müsste mal anhand eines kleineren Bootes probieren, wieviel Kraft nötig ist und wie man am besten steuert.)
Was diese Leute können, schaffen wir mit moderner Technik doch ganz leicht, oder?
Schöne Grüße aus dem sonnigen, aber kalten Toronto,
Robert
PS: Wikipedia sagt über das Treideln am Rhein: "Durch die Trägheit des breiten Stromes reichten vielfach 7 bis 10 Mann oder 1 Pferd für Ladungen von 10 bis 15 Tonnen." Wie viele Velos sind das?
29 February 2008
19 February 2008
sweet candy perseverance
Everybody knows that perseverance pays off. Just so we don't forget, here's another story about it.
I tried to make some puff-rice candy and when I was thinking about how much I would make, I had some feeling that I should first try to make just a little. (Although I usually think big in terms of food.)
So I started and was amazed how butter and sugar transformed in my much hotter than 100°C pot. When it started to look good I waited a bit until I turned off the heat and just in that couple of seconds the thing got dark and stinky like hell. I was so courageous to try some of it, but it tasted very... carcinogenic :-(
But here's the good news: after cleaning up the mess (and throwing the black candy monster into the garbage where I hope it will not breed and let it's offspring menace my suite mates) I gave it another try, this time closely monitoring the hot pot to figure out what would be the moment just before the irreversible would happen. And it is very interesting indeed: at first, butter and sugar are bubbling happily in the pot. But after some time the bubbling stops, the consistency changes and the mass slowly turns brown. This time I just let it go brown a bit and then took it off. I threw some puffed rice into the pot and mixed it with the caramel candy. Pour in a container, let cool and there you got your crispy sweet.
Actually I am writing this post just to remind myself of how I did it, so that next time I can hope to succeed with the first try.
Maybe you are wondering why I don't provide any measurements with the recipe, but really I didn't use any. Start with 50g butter, add sugar by instinctive measure, make caramel and add puffed rice by instinctive measure. The only critical thing is to find the right moment to make caramel without burning it. And that's why I am writing this post.
I tried to make some puff-rice candy and when I was thinking about how much I would make, I had some feeling that I should first try to make just a little. (Although I usually think big in terms of food.)
So I started and was amazed how butter and sugar transformed in my much hotter than 100°C pot. When it started to look good I waited a bit until I turned off the heat and just in that couple of seconds the thing got dark and stinky like hell. I was so courageous to try some of it, but it tasted very... carcinogenic :-(
But here's the good news: after cleaning up the mess (and throwing the black candy monster into the garbage where I hope it will not breed and let it's offspring menace my suite mates) I gave it another try, this time closely monitoring the hot pot to figure out what would be the moment just before the irreversible would happen. And it is very interesting indeed: at first, butter and sugar are bubbling happily in the pot. But after some time the bubbling stops, the consistency changes and the mass slowly turns brown. This time I just let it go brown a bit and then took it off. I threw some puffed rice into the pot and mixed it with the caramel candy. Pour in a container, let cool and there you got your crispy sweet.
Actually I am writing this post just to remind myself of how I did it, so that next time I can hope to succeed with the first try.
Maybe you are wondering why I don't provide any measurements with the recipe, but really I didn't use any. Start with 50g butter, add sugar by instinctive measure, make caramel and add puffed rice by instinctive measure. The only critical thing is to find the right moment to make caramel without burning it. And that's why I am writing this post.
7 February 2008
choose your programming language
they used to say: choose your programming language according to the problem you have.
now finally people start admitting: better choose the programming language that is best for your type of person: http://www.paulgraham.com/vanlfsp.html
now finally people start admitting: better choose the programming language that is best for your type of person: http://www.paulgraham.com/vanlfsp.html
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